


boys are boys are boys (it's whatever)

by angelatflightrisk



Category: DCU, Young Justice (Cartoon)
Genre: Barts not going for this standardized transphobia, Fluff, Jaime is sweet and protective but hes worrying about shit that doesnt matter, Khaji doesnt understand, M/M, Trans Character, Trans Male Character
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-21
Updated: 2017-03-21
Packaged: 2018-10-08 21:13:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,318
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10396284
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/angelatflightrisk/pseuds/angelatflightrisk
Summary: Bart's always been a boy





	

Bart doesn’t have a dramatic backstory on when he found out and how he told his family and how his reassignment went. He didn’t have a family, and he didn’t have a reassignment. Because being trans didn’t matter where he was from. He didn’t even know that there was a word for what he was-- he was a boy, always had been. That was that. That was all. It didn’t matter. Other things mattered much more.

He didn’t have a birthname, because he was ripped from his mother’s arms and put into slavery with nothing to him but a heartbeat, an inhibitor collar, and a number all before he could get a name. M-304, that was him. M for meta. Just the Reach’s way of further stripping them from any sense of humanity, of individuality that they could possibly grasp to.

He never knew what happened to his parents, assumed they were dead. It was sad, but it was just how it was.

M-304 was three when he met Nathaniel, who kept him safe through his childhood and told him stories of how the Earth used to be. When M-304 was five, he named himself Bart-- Bartholomew, after the Flash. His grandfather.

“I wish I could have known him,” Bart had said, once, when he was seven.

“I know,” Nathaniel had said, gently ruffling his hair, a sad smile playing on his lips as he said, “He would have loved you, Bart. I’m sorry things turned out like they did.”

In that time, Bart couldn’t name a time when he wasn’t hungry. The hunger-- that was one thing he wouldn’t forget. That aching, clawing, painful hunger, that growing up  _ starving _ , given only enough to keep you alive and working. Bart had always been small, skinny, too skinny. Puberty didn’t happen like it should have, lacking the proper fuel. His breasts never grew to be more than just little bug bites on his chest. He never got his period, at least not in his original time.

Nathaniel kept him as fed as he possibly could, and never told him by what means.  _ Never _ .

Bart was ten when he figured out time travel physics from nothing but conviction and the rubble of the world in hell, from what was left. Nathaniel didn’t have the heart to tell him it would never work. Nathaniel was astonished, absolutely short-circuited when Bart came rushing in, as fast as he could with that inhibitor collar and with his too-small frame, too small for eleven. His green eyes bright, wild, an absolutely childishly ecstatic look on his freckled face when he said, “I did it.”

From then on, it was all they worked on. Getting Bart back to the past, perfecting time travel. Quizzing Bart on how things worked in the past. Stitching the Impulse suit. Hacking his inhibitor collar. Keeping each other safe and uncaught. Developing his backstory-- tourist from the future. Feeding him more, trying to make it look like he hadn’t been starved his whole life.

Of course, it didn’t work spectacularly, and Bart still didn’t look like the poster-boy for eating enough when he was fourteen and it was time to go. Still incredibly lithe, still small for his age, fourteen and only 5’4. But it would do.

“You’re leaving tomorrow,” Nathaniel had said, and Bart met his eyes. He was an old, so forlorn. Empty. It was a common sight. Bart’s mouth quirked in a smile, a reassuring one.

“That’s a good thing, Nathaniel,” He reminded him softly, “Remember? I’m gonna crash the mode, and it’ll all be better. Don’t look so sad.”

Nathaniel caught Bart’s smile a little, at that, which only made Bart’s own smile grow.

“Bart,” Nathaniel started, “There’s something I haven’t told you.”

Nathaniel knew Bart was trans. He’d always known. He’d made sure Bart was aware of how his body worked, of how puberty would go for him, given their conditions. But he’d never told him what being trans entailed in the past.

That night, however, he had.

People in the past cared about that kind of thing, Nathaniel told him. Boys were supposed to be male, and girls were supposed to be female, and according to the past that was simply how it worked. Bart, being a boy with female biology, was considered taboo. He was ‘transgender’, Nathaniel told him. People from the past were ignorant at best, intolerant at worst.

“Just-- Bart, be careful,” Nathaniel had urged him, while Bart’s veins flooded with ice, while panic settled in his chest, “Don’t draw attention to it. All you have to do is pretend you’re not trans. That’s all. Just pretend, Bart. Can you do that for me?”

Bart had told him yes, of course,  _ yes _ . Why wouldn’t he? Why wouldn’t he want to keep it a secret, if it could get him hurt? A kind of hurt settled in his stomach, a kind of confusion and a kind of anger, simply not understanding how that could be a thing. People were people. Boys were boys. Why did what he had between his legs matter? Why did it have to be difficult?

When Impulse came back to the past, he was a boy. Just as he’d always been. But he was a boy with a different, very new kind of fear settled into his bones, a fear that came with being in severely uncharted waters, of having to hide something important out of fear that it could make people want to hurt you.

 

 

“You’re babbling again.”

Bart stopped in the middle of his sentence, his eyes flickering to meet the gentle dark brown of his friend’s, of Jaime’s. The statement wasn’t spoken contemptuously, or with any flicker of annoyance, Jaime’s lips quirked in amusement as he watched Bart, fondly. Bart huffed, maybe childishly, felt his face heat up.

“You could pretend to listen,” He teased back, unable to help the smile that appeared as Jaime laughed.

“That would be lying, and I’m genuinely interested in what you’re saying-- I just can’t understand you when your words blur together like that.”

In two years Bart had been in the past, Jaime had become his best friend at an alarming rate. He couldn’t ask for better.

 

 

Bart couldn’t read. He’d never learned-- The Reach intentionally prohibited it, made absolutely certain that nobody could. Stripping their humanity.

 

 

Bart learned a lot about other trans people through videos, through text-to-speech of articles. He found that the consensus, even if someone was  _ supportive _ , was that trans people were certainly taboo. He was more than a little unsettled by the widely accepted notion that if you were born trans, there was something wrong with you-- you were born in the wrong body.

Even some trans people seemed to believe this. Bart found it, quite frankly, disgusting. What left him horrified was the idea that if you were trans, your goal was to become the least degree of trans you possibly could.

The values of trans people were based on how cis they could be. It was status quo that trans people all collectively hate themselves. That was just the way it  _ was _ . Trans people weren’t on equal playing grounds, and it seemed that all of them were convinced that they only mattered if they could become as cis as possible. They weren’t right, otherwise.

Bart panicked upon learning this. Should he feel this way about himself? Hours of standing in the mirror, of staring at his reflection and trying to find it repulsive, of poking at his small chest, of examining the dip in his waist, of inspecting his soft features and his long lashes and his big eyes. Touching himself and trying to feel wrong, like his body was not his own if it had this biology.

But he never could. His body was his own, and as hard as he tried he couldn’t think otherwise. He thought he was kind of cute. He liked how he looked. He didn’t hate his possibly more feminine features, didn’t feel as though the pink between his legs mismatched with who he was. His body was his.

He couldn’t bring himself to feel like he owned girl parts. He didn’t. They were his parts, and he was a boy-- boy parts.

Just because he was trans didn’t mean he was exempt from being okay with himself. He’d heard that trans people sometimes felt uncomfortable doing anything sexual, and he understood that mindset-- he would probably be uncomfortable too, if he was raised believing his body didn’t match him, that it was wrong.

There was a quote Bart had heard once. That if you judged a fish on it’s ability to climb a tree, it will go it’s whole life believing it is stupid. That was how the world treated trans people, he decided. Like they needed to change to have any value.

It was ridiculous. It was appalling.

Bart stared into the mirror, in boyshorts and his binder, Impulse costume in hand. His eyes ran over his features, and he decided he felt right. He was himself. He was not a girl-- that was ridiculous. His body was absolutely irrelevant in determining how he was.

He was fine exactly the way he was.

 

 

“Hey Jaime?”

“Yeah?”

Bart played with the zipper of his hoodie, feeling his friend’s gaze on him and not meeting it. Even after learning how people viewed trans people and deciding that he was okay with himself, exactly how he was, and that being trans was something he should be unashamed of… Still. He’d been terrified ever since he came back.

What if Jaime thought differently of him? What if everyone did? It really didn’t matter if he was okay with himself if the whole world thought differently. Maybe he’d start to hate himself, after all.

“--Trans people,” He said, finally meeting Jaime’s eyes. He looked confused, maybe a little shocked.

“Um,” He said, blinking, “...What about them?”

“Well, what do you think of them?”

“I-- I mean? I don’t, really,” Jaime replied. He didn’t look uncomfortable, just confused, put on the spot and off-guard, “They exist, and it’s whatever. You know? Like, them existing doesn’t affect me. I think they exist. That’s all.”

“You don’t have an opinion?” Bart reiterated.

“I guess not. I mean, I definitely have an opinion on how they should be treated. With human decency. But I don’t think people existing should be controversial.”

Bart was grinning. Absolutely beaming, and Jaime looked more confused than ever when he met Bart’s eyes.

“Um,” His friend started, “...Why?”

“Jaime,” Bart couldn’t help the laugh coming from his chest, because that was perfect, that was wonderful, that was everything Bart could ask for. His biology didn’t make him strange. He existed. He just existed. He loved that.

“Bart?”

“Jaime, I’m trans.”

He was beaming, and Jaime’s eyes widened for only a second before he returned the smile, with exasperated fondness.

“Um, okay,” he said, nudging Bart’s shoulder, “Like I said, whatever. You’re still just you. It doesn’t matter.”

“I know.”

“Okay,” Jaime said, maybe a little more gently than before, a little more fondly, knowing now that he was talking to Bart about something that mattered to him, something important, “As long as you know.”

 

 

Bart came out to everyone not long after that. He was terrified, absolutely paralyzed, not sure if he was ready for the struggles that came with being openly transgender. Jaime was behind him when he told everyone, and when he’d frozen up, he felt Jaime’s hand slip into his. He took a breath, he started again.

 

 

Jaime and Bart’s transition from friends to lovers wasn’t unexpected. The addition of Khaji Da was, but a welcome surprise. A nice twist. A perfect one.

They’d talked about sex before. Jaime was worried that Bart would be uncomfortable, even scared, that maybe he’d feel like having sex was wrong because of how he was.

“Jaime,” Bart had said, trying not to sound too frustrated, “It doesn’t matter. It’s whatever.”

“--So, you’re not uncomfortable with…?”

“No,” He didn’t even hesitate, “When it’s time, when we feel like we want to, it won’t be a problem. It’s whatever.”

“I heard trans people get squeamish about vocabulary, too,” Jaime said gently, his fingers carding in Bart’s hair, “I-- I just really want to make sure you’re comfortable,  _ amorcito _ .”

Bart smiled at the pet name, shaking his head lightly, “I know. But it’s fine. Call it what it is. It’s my pussy, it’s my cunt, it’s  _ whatever _ . I’m a boy, and just because my biology is different than what people think it should be doesn’t mean I have to hate it. I’m all crash, Jaime.”

He meant it, as he pressed a kiss to their cheekbone, feeling their eyes flutter as Jaime switched for Khaji.

“Bart,” He said, his hands moving to Bart’s hips, pulling back slightly to look at him, “You’d tell us if you were uncomfortable?”

“‘Course, lovebug,” Bart cooed, kissing Khaji’s forehead, relishing in the satisfaction his little flustered breath brought him, “I’d tell you. But it isn’t a problem. Honestly, my only complaint is that you two aren’t currently fucking me.”

Khaji’s lips quirked up a little, “You and I are on the same page, then.”

“ _ Khaji _ ,” Jaime chided, visibly flustered as he switched out, avoiding Bart’s delighted expression as he throws a scolding look over his shoulder, “Honestly.”

“If Bart says we should not be worrying,” Khaji continues, the brown of Jaime’s eyes quickly turning to Khaji’s gold, “Then I see no reason to worry. Smothering him in something he doesn’t wish to be an issue would be counterproductive. Wouldn’t it?”

When Jaime came back, he was quiet for a moment before simply kissing Bart. Bart smiled against his mouth, taking that as agreement and silently thanking Khaji, running his fingertips gently over the scarab itself, listening to it chitter with his boyfriend’s apparent appreciation.

**Author's Note:**

> let me know what you think, what you want to see, request stuff, draw me things, WHATEVER JUST TALK TO ME my tumblr is
> 
> https://crashtacular.tumblr.com/


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